Humility, Resistance, and Future Glory - 1 Peter 5:6-11

Waiting for what you can’t yet see is hard; waiting well is even harder. We open 1 Peter 5 and explore how elect exiles live between the already of forgiveness and the not yet of final renewal—with humility that casts anxiety on God, vigilance that resists a prowling enemy, and hope that refuses to die in the dark.

We start by reframing identity: believers are fully adopted and indwelt by the Spirit, yet still on the road to resurrected bodies and a renewed creation. That tension can breed fear or pride, so Peter directs us toward a different posture—humble dependence. We talk about why anxiety often grows from the illusion of control, how Jesus’ images of birds and lilies reset our thinking, and how prayer becomes the moment we hand our burdens to the God who rules and cares. Peace that surpasses understanding isn’t mystical fog; it’s the steadying presence of God guarding hearts that keep coming back to Him.

Then we turn to vigilance. Scripture warns that an adversary stalks the inattentive, and compromise usually creeps, not sprints. We get practical about media, habits, and the quiet ways desires get trained against our hope. You can’t tame sin; you either resist it or get eaten. So we map a better path: stock the mind with what is true, honorable, and pure; run when conviction roars; and refuse the lie that disobedience offers more joy than obedience ever could.

Finally, we anchor in promise. Suffering is “a little while” compared to the “eternal glory” to which God has called us, and He Himself will restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish His people. That future shapes our present, freeing us to work hard without grasping, to resist without despair, and to wait without cynicism. If this conversation steadies your heart, share it with a friend, subscribe for more, and leave a review to help others find the hope you found today.

Transcript

Elect Exiles And The Already–Not Yet

unknown 0:00

Amen.

Present Blessings And Future Hope

What Do We Do While We Wait

Humble Yourselves And Cast Anxiety

Anxiety, Pride, And Prayerful Trust

Consider The Birds And The Lilies

Thinking Rightly About God

SPEAKER_00 0:01

1 Peter chapter 5, beginning in verse 6. We are seeing everything summarized in this text this morning. But I do want to summarize for you a few things that may not be explicit in this text, but are explicit throughout the whole book. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, the spokesperson of the Twelve, has written this letter to many churches that are experiencing or beginning to experience persecution. He writes to them, calling them elect exiles. Elect, meaning they have placed their faith and trust in Christ. They are his one people, elect people. We are those people by virtue of our faith in Jesus. Yet we are exiles. We still await the day he will return and cause the new Jerusalem to descend out of heaven and make his dwelling place with us. Theologians have long called this truth the already not yet. We are already God's people, but we are not yet what we will be when He returns. We are already fully forgiven from the punishment of our sin, but we are not yet finally free from the presence of sin in our lives. Think for a moment, what are some blessings we already possess as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ? Well, our sins have been forgiven. We've been adopted into God's family. We call God our Father, and He calls us His children. We have God's Holy Spirit indwelling within us, enabling us to serve Him with gladness, to obey Him with gladness. We're empowered by God's Spirit for global mission. We're gifted by God's Spirit to serve one another. These are blessings we already possess, but there are blessings as well we have not yet experienced in our relationship with Jesus. The removal of the presence of sin in our lives, the riddance of disease and viruses and syndromes and sickness, the resurrection of our bodies and the renewed heavens and earth. We are already God's, yet not what we will be yet when he returns. There are verses that speak to this. I want to share with you a few. John chapter 5, verse 24. Truly, truly, I say to you, Jesus says, Whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. You are not waiting for eternal life. You have it in Jesus. He is life eternal. Yet Romans 8:23, and not only the creation, but we ourselves who have the first fruits of the Spirit grown inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. There's still things we're waiting on. Or take again 1 John chapter 3, verse 2, which I quoted earlier. Beloved, we are God's children now, but what we will be has not yet appeared, but we know that when he appears, we will be like him, because we shall see him as he is. So here's the reality. In a somewhat unique way, we find ourselves in a space and time in between who we are because of Christ's first coming and what we will be at Christ's second coming. The question is, like, what do we do in the meantime? Why are we here? What are we intended to do? Where should our focus be? You could answer that in many ways. To glorify God by making disciples, to give a picture of heaven in a war-torn world. I mean, the whole book of 1 Peter, it's bookended with hope. Hope because of Christ's first coming, hope because Christ is coming again in the middle. The command, the charge of Peter is to live holy and humble lives in the midst of a hostile world. I mean, really, if you want an outline of the book, you can literally put it on paper. Chapter one, hope. Chapter five, hope. Holy and humble lives in the meantime, in the midst of a hostile world. Chapter one, you're to be holy as Jesus is holy. You are a holy nation, chapter two. Therefore, humble yourselves in the way that you relate to your government, to your spouse, to your employer, to your church member. Humble yourselves as Jesus humbled himself. As you lived in a hostile world, that you would suffer underneath, even unrighteous suffering. This is the charge of 1 Peter. We live in this unique space in time, elect yet exiles. Elect yet exiles. And the question is, while we wait with hope, what do we do in the meantime? Well, there's certainly a lot of things first Peter tells us, but he concludes with three focuses in our heart and in our mind. Three focuses. Three statements we should remember in the meantime. I'll read our passage aloud as it's been read. Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that at the proper time he may exalt you, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. Be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him. Firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you've suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be dominion forever and ever. Amen. Three things to focus on in the meantime. Number one. Number one. Oh, would you humble yourself enough to relinquish the control you think you have over your life? Would you humble yourself to relinquish the control you think you have over your life? That's the text. Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you. Do you feel anxious? Now in life. Circumstances that are happening. Christmas is drawing near. Kids are out of control. Maybe just things aren't going the way that you thought they would go. Life isn't as smooth as you seemed it would be. You've got a lot to do before work starts back tomorrow. Maybe you're struggling with besetting sin that you just can't fight. You're anxious. And it links it with a call to humility. Anxiety, as we might think about it, is kind of like a pool of worry that is crippling. And we feel like we're unable to control the future. Our text tells us to humble ourselves in light of that. Because there are two responses that we can have biblically when anxiety tends to well up in our heart. We can respond with pride or humility. Pride or humility. Question is not will you face seasons and situations that bring difficulty and pool in our heart a sort of anxiety? The question is how will you respond? We respond to anxiety in our life in pride if we don't trust the mighty hand of God to provide for us. And instead of seeking his provision, we avoid prayer and we trust our own willpower to provide for ourselves and to handle whatever comes our way. Peter's concerned about that. And so he says, humble yourselves. We respond in humility as we struggle against anxiety. If we faithfully serve God in the present, despite whatever situation may arise, we seek first his kingdom, we pray for his wisdom, and we trust him to provide. You see, worry can become a form of pride because it often involves taking one's concerns upon oneself instead of entrusting concern to God. So when situations and seasons arise that cause us to have to just simply endure, may we entrust ourselves to God whose mighty hand has split seas, has delivered people, and has destroyed nations. Instead of like embracing anxiety as a sort of competition with how white our knuckles can be, how we can handle it, and how we can take on the brunt of difficulty. Jesus did talk about anxiety. Matthew chapter 6. He talks about it in the Sermon on the Mount. And he teaches that by his sovereign power he provides for people he dearly loves. So would you entrust yourself to his care? Here's what he says. Matthew chapter 6, beginning in verse 25. Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air. He gives an illustration. Look at the birds of the air. Look up. They neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns. They don't have a plan to feed themselves for a long time. Some kind of strategy. Yet your heavenly Father, he feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you, by being anxious, can add a single hour to his span of life? And he gives another illustration. And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field. Look down, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. Yet I tell you, even Solomon, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you? O you of little faith. Therefore, do not be anxious, saying, What shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or what shall we wear? This passage, Jesus likens the sort of crippling anxiety, concern about controlling tomorrow's circumstances to a lack of faith in God. He tells us not to be anxious because our anxiety actually reveals something. And it reveals something greater than simply the stress of just being busy. Anxiety often, not always, but often arises where there is a lack of faith in God's sovereignty and providence. Let me be clear. We have studies that talk about natural consequences of what the Bible would call sloth. If you sit at home and you're on your phone all day and you don't go outside all day, you don't take care of your own body that God's given you, it will cause anxiety. We have statistic after statistic telling us that. And it's the result of sin. There are natural consequences to sin like sloth. But the type of anxiety spoken of here in the text is, again, the pooling of concerns where you feel like you can't control tomorrow and you're trying to. And what I think scripture is telling us here is ultimately you don't control tomorrow. So will you humble yourself to kind of try to give up tomorrow's concerns because God cares for you. He controls tomorrow. I mean, anxiety sometimes brings to the surface the reality that there's no circumstance you absolutely, totally control. Your future, both immediate and eternal, is ultimately held by God. Will you trust Him to care for you? Will you humble yourself to say, God, you are in control. I trust you. This goes for Christian suffering. I don't understand. Job never received an answer for why he suffered. You know that? You know, we're we're outsiders to the story of Job. First two chapters, we have that whole back and forth in heaven between the Satan, Satan, the accuser. And God says, if you consider my servant Job, God, at least on our record, does not say, hey Job, this is what happened in heaven before all the calamity that was brought upon your life by Satan. What happens is Job goes from I will not curse God to God, why are you doing this to me? And God responds from a whirlwind and says, Where were you when I created everything? The the the sort of antidote to the anxiety that arises when you just don't feel like you can control tomorrow in the scriptures is look up at God. He controls the world. And he cares for you. God's sovereignty is the sort of thing that we are supposed to think of in anxiety. I read somewhere just recently that anxiety is often caused from a lack of thinking. Clinical theological theolog clinical um uh uh prac practitions have have studied this a lack of thinking. And the biblical antidote is think of God, think of him, lift your eyes. He both controls and cares. So cast whatever cares you have upon him. God says, Give me your fear, your failure, your uncertainty, your concerns. Why? Look at the text. Because I love you. Because I care for you. Paul writes similarly to his brother Peter when he says, Don't be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God, and the peace of God, which just doesn't make sense. The biblical text is which surpasses all understanding. The peace of God, which just doesn't make sense, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. What do you need when you worry? Peace. Where do you need it? In your heart and your mind. Where is it found? God. In prayer. That's the first thing he says. Life seems uncontrollable. There's one who controls it and he cares for you. Second focus. Second focus. Be aware of your enemy and resist his desire. Be aware of your enemy and resist his desire. Be sober-minded, verse 8. Be watchful. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Here's the word. Resist him. So what's the command? Be watchful. Keep your mind alert. Why? Because Satan is looking to allure you, to cause you to slowly abandon your allegiance to Jesus and ultimately destroy the hope that you have in him by devouring you in sin. He wants to take your hope off of Jesus by small steps of disobedience to Jesus. As a pastor, a former student pastor of a number of years, I get I get asked every once in a while, hey, you know, what are you watching on Netflix now? What are you listening to? All those kinds of things. And for the most part, what I'm watching on Netflix is probably something you've already seen on Netflix that I liked because I want to start something new. I'm watching a show right now that I watched like four other times before because I know that I like it. I just do. And I think among Christians, we feel this need sometimes to just be in the know of what the world is consuming. Like just want to know what they're watching, what they're consuming, what they're listening to. And hey, if the world is watching something wholesome, then sure, watch whatever it is. But sometimes we feel a need to watch what everyone else is watching no matter what they're watching, so we don't get left out of the conversation, so that we won't get, you know, considered a cultural weirdo. And hear me, I don't think your TV is sinful. I don't think it has the capacity to sound. But a TV, like a phone, like any other resource similar, can be an avenue to enjoyment and an avenue to things that God finds deplorable. And consistently being entertained by what God finds deplorable is a short road to ruin. I mean, think about it. If I find myself entertained by something that includes incest, sexual perversion, promiscuity, and horrific violence, is Jesus pleased. And if the lion of the tribe of Judah is not pleased, then who is? I submit to you a different lion. The one who wants to delude you into thinking that consistent small steps of disobedience won't eventually devour you. I'm a pastor, but I'm a believer, one who struggles with sin, just like you and I. But as a pastor, can I just plead with you, don't play with sin. Don't do it. I've had many a times where I was slated with an opportunity to speak next to someone. We prepared a lesson, we're speaking to students on any number of things, young adults on any number of things, and days before we speak together, that individual was caught in sin, habitual sin that had festered and grown. And they did not only destroy their ministry, that's one thing. They destroyed their family. I don't have a family anymore. I was called to serve more recently in a position before we moved here because of sin. It seeks to destroy you, and Satan is the tempter. He's a lion. I don't know if you've ever heard of the show When Animals Attack. When animals attack. What it's about is what you think it's about. When animals attack. Well, not long ago on that show, they were talking about when an animal attacked, and in this certain segment, this episode, it was a story of a model that a company that wanted to advertise its shampoo asked to come, and I asked that model to come and sit lay next to a lion. Show how beautiful your hair could become, like a lion's mane. So she was called to lay by the lion, kind of stroke its mane, as she just shows how soft and great your hair can be. Well, as the story goes, the lion ripped her apart. Ripped her apart. And you're thinking, well, yeah, that's kind of what lions do, right? Like top of the food chain, the alpha, right? King of the jungle, whatever you want to call them. They kill for killing's sake. Of course it makes sense. But in the show, they interviewed the trainer, and the trainer said, I couldn't have seen it coming. You know, like I had this lion all my life. I I bathed the lion, I fed the lion, I moved the lion from a small cage to a bigger cage, I washed after it, I left it in this corner, not in that corner. I told it what to do, I tamed it. So it is with sin. Some of us think that we can manage our sin. We can put it over here, but not over there. We'll do this, but not that. We'll go this far, not that far. All the while, Satan is seeking to devour you in the small sins that you say, not a big deal. Don't manage sin in your life. It will come for you. It will come for you. Some of us believe we have our sin managed because we've trained it all without realizing how I am counseling something that is bent on consuming me. The text says not only a lion, but a roaring lion. Now, I don't think the text is intentionally saying that the lion is just loud. I think it's talking about its ferocity, but I think there are certain times where we know as Christians our conviction light bulb just kind of flashes before our eyes. Hey, this is not good, this is not good, this is not good, this is not good, don't go down this road. You know what God has said about this? When you hear the roar run, run. Not so long ago, I was, I served in Tampa, Florida as a pastor for seven and a half years. Most of you know that because a lot of you came up, of course, with us. Well, I love kayaking. I love it. It's one of my favorite things to do. Just get out on the river, kayak, find a trail, find some rapids, whatever it might be. I grew up kayaking. We lived by uh a river, uh spring-fed river close to our hometown in Missouri. When I moved to Florida, I took our kayaks and learned that kayaking in Florida is way different than kayaking in Missouri. Well, one reason is because kayaking in Florida, you can't really tell if you're going like upriver or downriver because it's just like one swamp. You take a GPS with you too, because you don't really know where you are at any given time. It's not like one flowing waterway. And also because they have what some call swamp puppies. Alligators. They're alligators in Florida waters. So I had to get used to that. On my first time, times going out on the water, uh a guy from our church took me out and said, Hey, let's go, let's go floating. And you know, went on a two-hour float. And on that two-hour float, where we put in our kayak and came back, we saw somewhere between 15 and 20 alligators, pretty normal for about a you know, two-hour float. And you get pretty close to them, but they kind of mind their own business. Well, one day, one of the guys from our church said, Hey, let's go on a longer float. There's this kind of pass that I've been wanting to go down, and so I was like, okay, that sounds good. Six-hour float, sounds great. And so we go, we drive into this state park, and he tells the ranger, hey, just FYI, we're going down this you know, waterway. And the ranger says, Okay, what are your names? I didn't know at that moment that was because they needed to identify us if we didn't come back. So we wrote down our names and we get on the water, and we're going in the water, and there's like a sign that's like, hey, don't go past this point if you're smart. I didn't say exactly that, but it basically said that. And we kept going. Well, in kayaking in Florida, uh, you have to oftentimes get out of your kayak, stand and kind of balance on a tree that's fallen over, move your kayak over that tree and kind of balance and get back in the kayak and keep going. And in a place that's not often kayaked, there's more and more of those. So you have to get out every 40 meters or so. And in a place that's not kayaked often, there's not roads nearby. There's a mile of swampland here, a mile of swampland there. There's 40 meters in front of me before I have to get out of the tree, get over another tree again, and there's gators everywhere. Like eight-footers. Well, we were on this kayak trail, and I am like on the verge of peeing my pants. And we get over a tree and we see an eight-footer on an embankment, and for the first time ever, that gator is hissing at us. A smart person would not have gone on that trip. Sometimes we have sin all around in opportunities, and we dance around it as if it's not coming to devour us. Run from sin. Here's a word for you: there exists no pleasure and disobedience that's worth the pain of being devoured. I want to plead with you to not believe the lie, that there is more to be gained in disobeying Jesus than in obeying him. That there's not more joy to be found in disobeying him than in obeying him. So here's my encouragement. Keep your mind sober by keeping it on scripture. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there's any excellence, if there's anything worthy of praise, think about those things. Think about them. Put your mind there. Last thing to keep before you in the meantime. Trust that the good plans of God will be accomplished by the great power of God. Trust the good plans of God will be accomplished by the great power of God. Let's look at it briefly. And after you've suffered a little while, verse 10, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. His dominion be forever and ever. This suffering for a little while is the space and time between Jesus' first coming and his second. This is the already not yet. This is the meantime. This is the time of waiting, but it's not a time of waiting without hope. Like Daniel, an exile in enemy territory, Babylon, who had Jeremiah 29-11 in his mind, where the prophet Jeremiah said, After 70 years, God will return these exiles, his people, back to their homeland Jerusalem. We are similarly exiles, strangers in a foreign land, awaiting our future home, the new Jerusalem. Would we pray and keep our attention in mind that God will fulfill that promise, just like Daniel praying three times a day? God, bring your promises. We're like Daniel looking toward Jerusalem as he prayed in Babylon, strangers and sojourners living in a dim lit foreign hotel awaiting our future home, the new Jerusalem. And no long, no matter how long our suffering might be, we must remind ourselves it is short in light of eternity, or humility will break way into glory, brokenness into beauty, suffering to strength, mortification to glorification, sin to spotlessness. God dwelling in us, to God dwelling with us. Listen to me, church. The same God who saved you will sustain you and will present you blameless at the day of his return. And he can, because he is the controller of everything. So let's not fear. We are his. And what we will be when he appears. It's great. Let's pray. God our Father, who sits in heaven above, who controls everything that takes place. We thank you that you are not only a God of sovereignty, but a God of care. You use your power to provide for us. Oh, how blessed we are. Help us to try not to take all the matters of our life into our own hands, but serve faithfully, work heartily, trust you. Help us to not lean on our own understanding. But look above. Help us to not be anxious, but to seek you in prayer. And God, would you give us peace that doesn't make sense? God, we love you. Keep us until you come back. In your name we pray. Amen.